A Matter of Faith
by Bratling
Summary: Neelix struggles with the aftermath of his death in Mortal Coil with a little help from some friends.


A Matter of Faith

by Bratling

Rating: PG for language

Disclaimer: If you think these characters belong to me, you're sadly mistaken. I borrowed them, hugged them, squeezed them, called them George, and then gave them back like a good girl. Star Trek and all it's permutations belong to the estate of Gene Roddenberry, Paramount, and CBS.

Author's Note: I've come to the conclusion that the muse has ADD when it comes to Voyager. I'm working on two other longer stories, and this takes off season 4's _Mortal Coil_ because it just won't leave me alone. I rediscovered the series on NetFlix and have spent the past couple weeks rewatching it. This is what you get when a Trekkie Sunday School teacher watches the episode. (I teach the 4-5 year old class. My adorable five-year-old niece, Nikki, is in it!) None of this belongs to me... except Lieutenant Rebekah Andersen.

My thanks to Daena, who encouraged me to put this out here. To be perfectly honest, I'm still hesitant, because I've never seen anything like this in Star Trek fanfic. Heck, it's an uncommon theme in most fandoms; _Forever Knight_ is an exception because canon themes running through the show included things like faith, sin, redemption, repentance, all of that stuff. So just a warning. This is weird. A little different. Not something usually found in fanfic at all. Maybe a bit of side J/C, but no real romance. Somewhat heavy theme. My thanks to miacooper for betaing for me.

* * *

 _"Faith is knowing the sun will rise, lighting each new day._

 _Faith is knowing the Lord will hear my prayers each time I pray._

 _Faith is like a little seed:_

 _If planted, it will grow._

 _Faith is a swelling within my heart._

 _When I do right, I know."_

 _-Beatrice Goff Jackson, Children's Songbook, #96_

* * *

Neelix had been dealing with insomnia ever since his death a few days before. He was tired, but sleep wasn't an option because he had nightmares every time he closed his eyes. He hadn't been his normal, cheerful self, either. He felt like he was just going through the motions, marking time.

Honestly, he wasn't sure why he was still sticking around, except for Naomi. He'd taken a page from Captain Janeway's and Commander Chakotay's books and was wandering the ship instead of sleeping. He was close to the mess hall when he smelled something mouthwatering. Without much thought, he pushed opened the door.

He was greeted by a woman wearing a blue and black science uniform, swathed by one of his large aprons. Her dark hair had been braided around her head and as she turned to greet him, he noticed a smear of flour on one cheek. "Lieutenant Andersen, is it that time of year again already?" he asked.

"Hey Neelix," Rebekah said with a slight smile of greeting, her soft accent pronounced. It sounded like she'd been crying. "Rachel's birthday. She's eight."

He watched as she used the tongs to expertly turn over some sort of breaded thing and then covered the dark frying pan with a mesh screen. "What are you making?" he asked as she moved to a large pot and stirred the contents.

"Comfort food," she said. "The replicators just can't get it right, so I replicated the ingredients; my rations. Fried chicken, cooked to death beans, collards, biscuits, strawberries-and-cream cake, and some caramel brownies for the Captain." She started dicing berries and he watched her start to assemble a cake. She flitted between tasks, removing chicken when it was done, placing it on a rack to drain, and adding more to the pan.

He needed a distraction. "What's the story behind this meal?" he asked.

"There isn't much of one," Rebekah said as she stirred one of the pots. "It's traditional cuisine from the southern region of North America on Earth... Probably Creole food would be closer to Talaxian cooking. Or Mexican. Hell, even a low country boil would have more pungent flavors than this-you should ask Ensign Kim about that. He's from South Carolina, after all."

He watched her work on the cake. "And the cake?"

"My version of strawberry shortcake, and my daughter's favorite," she said, as she swiped her hand across her face, leaving a smear of whipped cream.

"You never said why, exactly you do this when you got permission a few years back," Neelix ventured after a few minutes more of watching her.

"It keeps me busy," she said with a shrug. "It keeps me from dwelling on what I'm missing." Rebekah drew in a deep breath, and piled chicken in a chafing dish to keep warm. "She'll be getting baptized soon, and I won't be there to see it. It's hard missing all the milestones in her life, and it makes me miss her and my husband even more."

Neelix scratched his whiskers. "Baptism? That's something from one of the Terran religions, isn't it?"

She nodded absently as she stirred the diced strawberries into some whipped cream and started spreading it between split layers of the cake. "Different Christian sects do it differently. Mine doesn't do it before eight. In a way, it's a rite of passage, making promises to God of how you want to live."

"God," he scoffed. "I'm not sure about any of that sort of thing anymore." The Great Forest certainly looked to be just another folk tale, after all.

"I am," she said simply as she stirred another pot and popped a tray of biscuits in the oven.

"How?' he asked suddenly. "How can you know?"

"You mean like math and science?" she asked. "There are concrete answers there for any number of things." Rebekah picked up a spatula and started to spread whipped cream over the cake. "You can't. Not really. It all comes down to faith." She paused for a moment to pick up a piping bag and piped rosettes around the top of the cake and in the center.

"Faith," he snorted. "I'm not sure what I believe anymore."

"Yes, you do," she said quietly. "Scuttlebutt has it that your faith has been shaken by your recent near death experience. It happens to everyone sooner or later."

"What, death?"

"That, too," she said as she put strawberries into the rosettes. "For me, it was being thrown out here. I was supposed to transfer to the Enterprise to be with Steve and Rachel after our three week mission. I spent a lot of time feeling sorry for myself and even didn't want to live anymore for a while. My faith kept me going."

"If yours was shaken-" he began.

"It pulled me through," Rebekah said quietly. "When terrible things happen and hard times come you only have two choices; to turn to your faith or away from it. I made a decision to keep believing and it's make me a better person. I get through the hard times because of it." She turned the meat in the pan, replaced the screen, and started putting halved strawberries around the bottom edge of the cake. "Faith is _not_ to have a perfect knowledge of things. In the end, that's what it boils down to-almost every culture has their own faith; the need to believe in something bigger than themselves."

Neelix looked down at the counter top and fiddled with the sleeves of his jacket. "But how do you _know_?" he asked.

"'Faith is the subject of things _hoped_ for, the evidence of things _not seen'_." she quoted softly. "Even science relies on faith. Old scientific 'laws' are disproved by new knowledge all the time. Your faith becomes part of who you are and integral to your identity and self image." She must have heard the door open, because she turned towards it. "Isn't that right, Commander?"

Commander Chakotay walked in, sniffing deeply. "Something smells real good in here," he commented. "Is what right?"

"Your faith becomes part of who you are," Neelix said quietly.

"Yes. I've found it to be so, anyway." Chakotay snagged a chair, and straddled it with his arms loosely resting on the back.

"Sorry, Commander, no fry bread this time," Rebekah pulled the tray of biscuits out of the oven and stuck a pan in.

Chakotay grinned, flashing dimples. "I'd like a biscuit," he said, "And some cake."

Rebekah snorted softly. "Biscuits are too hot right now and you need an actual meal instead of just sugar."

"It's the mother in her," he said in a stage whisper to Neelix.

Rebekah pretended not to hear him. "Is the Captain coming? Her brownies are in the oven."

Chakotay nodded. "Sometimes I wonder why we've got you in sciences instead of here in the mess hall."

Rebekah smiled. "Because I'm not a mess specialist and I can only cook for up to twelve at a time? Or maybe you need my PhD more in sciences than in the kitchen." she said dryly. "You're the one who suggested I try this as therapy, oh unofficial ship's counselor." She winked at Neelix. "I think he suggested it for the home cooking."

"Hey," he protested, "I don't come here _every_ time you're cooking something."

For a moment, Neelix was distracted from the topic. "How did you know that she cooks?"

Chakotay shrugged. "She was trying to butter up the professor with baked goods."

"What the Commander is trying to say is that I had some problems in his advanced tactics class." Rebekah grabbed a tray and loaded it up. "I was in the last class he taught at the Academy and he helped me get through it, so I brought him homemade goodies as a thank you. Tactics don't come naturally to me. It's why I'm science track instead of command." She handed the tray to Neelix.

He eyed it warily, took it, and put it on the table next to Chakotay. He sat down and reached for the fried chicken. She walked over and put a bottle next to him before returning to the stove. "You'll probably want Tabasco sauce to go on it," she advised as she pulled the last of the chicken out of the pan and set it on the rack to drain. Quickly, she turned off the heat, filtered the grease from the pan, and put both aside to cool.

Neelix shook some sauce on the chicken and took a bite. It wasn't spicy as he would have liked but the outer coating was crunchy and the inside was succulent and perfectly cooked. "This is really good," he said with a ghost of a smile. "Can I have the recipe?" He poked at the cooked greens curiously.

"Sorry, old family secret," Rebekah said absently as she loaded up another tray and brought it to Chakotay. She went back to the serving hatch and returned with butter and honey, which she set next to him. The timer went off, so she went and removed a pan from the oven and put it aside to cool.

"Why so much?" Neelix asked. "I mean, you've got enough here to feed at least twelve people, maybe more." He eyed the chafing dish heaped with fried chicken, the large, cloth-lined basket filled with dozens of biscuits, and the big pots of vegetables.

Rebekah filled her own tray and brought it over. "Someone always shows up when I do this who needs it," she said. "I believe God puts us where we can do the most good sometimes and it never fails that people always show up to eat. Ensign Kim came last time just as I was pulling an apple pie from the oven."

Neelix was momentarily distracted by the mention of apple pie. "I tried to make that for him once," he admitted.

"Now _that_ , I can teach you," Rebekah offered. "And Neelix? it's not that his mother's pie is really, really good... it's just that it's familiar. A few months ago, he told me that she's not really a good cook, and that she once made a pie crust with only flour and water."

Neelix frowned. "But that's glue..." he trailed off.

"Sounds inedible to me," Chakotay said through a mouth full of biscuit.

"If he had his mother's apple pie, he'd have his mother within reach, too and he misses her." Rebekah said. "All of us are in the same place-through one way or another, our families are a long way from here. Voyager is our family right now and families help each other."

"Yes we are, and yes families do help each other," all of them turned towards the door at the sound of the captain's husky voice. "As you were." Captain Janeway smiled at the trio. "Mind if I join you?"

Chakotay smiled and patted the seat next to him. Rebekah simply stood, grabbed a clean tray, filled it and plunked it down in front of the Captain. A few seconds later, the basket of biscuits ended up in front of the command team. "The rest of the crew may believe that you survive on coffee alone, but I know better," she commented as she sat down.

There was silence for a few minutes as they ate their late dinner. "I don't understand, Captain," Neelix said finally. "You're a scientist-"

"Yes," she said, "And you're talking about faith. Remember the Nechani homeworld?"

"Of course I do," Neelix protested. "You saved Kes-"

"Through faith I never knew I had," Janeway finished the thought. "Science and faith aren't as incompatible as I once thought. Some people say that faith is just unproven science. The Lieutenant here is a scientist, too," she pointed out.

"The more I learn, the more I find out that I have yet to learn," Rebekah leaned back in her chair. "Some things I just accept on faith."

"It's just that I didn't see anything," Neelix grumbled.

"There have been studies done on near-death experiences for centuries," Chakotay said. "Some saw exactly what they expected to see, while others saw nothing. The only answer is that we don't really know what happens. Death is the greatest mystery and the greatest equalizer of existence."

"Remember what happened to Ensign Kim our first year?" Rebekah asked. "There was some evidence that the people in that dimension were at least partially correct. He couldn't stop talking about it... his first death. Who knows what really happens? My people believe that our families can be eternal." She smiled. "Even if I don't make it home, I'll see Steve and Rachel again; we've promised each other eternity."

Neelix bowed his head and restlessly picked apart his biscuit. Hope stirred faintly in his heart. Perhaps a lifetime of faith and belief wasn't in vain.

Chakotay reached over and clapped him on the shoulder. "You have family here, Neelix. Whatever comes, we're here."

"Your family is all gone, too, Commander?" he asked. At Chakotay's nod, he continued. "Do you believe-"

"Yes, I do," Chakotay interrupted. "The specifics differ from tribe to tribe, but whatever lies beyond, I do believe I'll see them again."

As Neelix lapsed into silence again, Rebekah grinned at the command team. "I don't think I'll have to wait that long. I mean, we've traveled half the distance as it is... I figure that with a bit of luck our Captain here will get us home or at least find a way to contact home within the next five years."

Janeway gave them a crooked smile. "I hope so."

Rebekah stood up and retrieved the cake. "Professor, care to get the Captain's brownies for me?"

Seemingly without a second thought, Chakotay grabbed the pan from the counter and helped her gather plates and utensils. He set the pan down in front of the Captain as Rebekah started slicing the cake. Quickly, she plated slices and set them in front of people. "Those are all yours," she said, nodding at the pan. "I know they're not your mother's, Captain..."

"Still buttering up the professor," Chakotay remarked as he split another biscuit and started spreading butter and honey on it.

Janeway smiled. "Thank you, Lieutenant."

Rebekah grinned "If the rumor mill is correct, you can get your replicator to burn water-that takes _talent_." She sliced up the brownies and piled them onto a plate.

Chakotay was obviously trying not to laugh. "She can convince it to make her coffee."

Neelix through about saying something, but he had too much on his mind. Instead, he ate some cake and tried to think. Absently, he heard the Captain tease Chakotay back and without thought, he volunteered to clean the galley after everyone finished eating. Rebekah offered to help, but he refused. So much had happened. "I'd like to be alone for a while, please," he said quietly.

Soon, the three officers left with Rebekah splitting off to go to the aeroponics bay. Almost on autopilot, he put the leftovers away and started washing the dishes. Faith was something that had been on his mind lately, and he'd never heard the clerics on Talax describe it the way his friends did. He was far from an expert on the subject or even his own religion, but he had believed his entire life. It was just that recent events had called everything he had once believed into question.

With a sigh, he finished the dishes and started wiping down surfaces. Both Commander Chakotay and Lieutenant Andersen had strong beliefs. Sometimes it amazed him that humans had so many belief systems; after all, Crewman Silverman was Jewish and he was aware of more belief systems among the Terrans from Voyager's database.

He sighed again as he plopped down on one of the chairs and stared at the starfield outside the window. It was hypnotizing, in a way and he wasn't really seeing it. What did he believe after all? Was the great forest really real? Would he see his family again someday? He wasn't sure. But perhaps it really was up to him how he reacted to recent events. For now, perhaps it was enough to hold on and be patient. Perhaps he needed to take a hard look at what he'd previously held to be immutable truths and decide what, exactly, he believed. Perhaps it really did come down to a matter of faith.

End.


End file.
